spring projects

I have dropped the ball terribly in terms of maintaining this blog! so much for my new year's resolution to post something every month - I did say that, didn't I? oh well, I'm nothing if not consistent - this resolution, went the way most of my new year resolutions go - which is why I make a point of not making new year resolutions!

my lack of posting doesn't mean I haven't been completely unproductive. here are some snaps of three projects I completed since the last time I posted.

a baby quilt - an uncomplicated pattern, your basic many trips around the world. I like to make baby quilts that will be used -- which is why I tend prefer quilt designs that don't intimidate. I envision that a magical mouse baby quilt will be used (and abused) for years. all of the baby quilts I make are made with 100% cotton materials and completely machine washable. I love it when I see one of my baby quilts years later and it is ragged and threadbare - then I know it gave love and was loved.

the colors and material chosen for this quilt were chosen to represent the four classical elements - earth, water, air, and fire. encircling the blue border is an adaptation of a native american prayer. the words I have stitched on the border are:

Through the returning seasons may I walk.
On the trail marked with pollen may I walk.
With grasshoppers about my feet may I walk.
With dew about my feet may I walk.
In beauty may I walk.

last month our friends randeep and adam were married - to celebrate their union I made one of my tried and true wedding wall-hangings. the symbolism of the wall-hanging is obvious - the colors I choose for the rings represent the couples favorite colors. it is a coincidence that the last two wedding wall-hangings I have done have been for couples which favor red and blue - in fact, this quilt looks very much like the last one - the border fabrics are the same I used in this are the same as I used in that. I had just enough of both the multicolor border fabric for one more wall-hanging - which I think is great as I really like the fabrics.

also this spring I had an interesting project. it actually turned out much better than I anticipated for I had never attempted such a thing before. a friend asked me if I could make "a ham with legs" for him so he could give it to his girlfriend as a gift for mother's day. the back story is the girlfriend has a bulldog which they affectionately refer to as "a ham with legs" - he wanted to surprise his girlfriend with token of his affection for her and her dog.

unfortunately, there is a sad end to this story. the gift was a great sucess - my friend was pleased with how it turned out and his girlfriend, when presented with the gift was tickled and touched. but alas, the relationship did not last - a bit more than a month after he presented the ham to his girl, they broke up. I don't know what has or will happen to the stuffed ham....maybe the canine version of "the ham with legs" will get hold of it the stuffed one.

tick-tock

last month I had the audacity to put forward a resolution that I would post at least once a month on this blog. at the time this seemed like a realistic goal; it's not like a month goes by without me working on something in the studio.

february hasn't been all that productive in terms of quilting projects despite piecing a large bed quilt (86x90) (at least this is large by my standards, I generally make wall-hangings, baby quilts, or lap-quilts) . I didn't have any pressing projects on the board, so I got it into my head to make a bed quilt for my daughter em. I made her a bed quilt in 1997 when she graduated from high school and it was very loved and very used and right now it is ....well in tatters...

the plan was to use the day of the dead fabrics that em bought a while ago. early on in the project I told her I was finally going to use the day of the dead fabric. told her my idea was to pull out the various colors that were in the main fabrics and just use stuff from my stash and have the quilt be somewhat scrappy. she was enthusiastic. early on, I asked if she would come up to the studio so she could see what the 'plan' was and how it was looking so far ....she replied, "no, I want to be surprised, I always like what you do"

famous last words.... both the accompanying fabrics and the pattern I selected for the quilt didn't pass muster! I learned em doesn't care for yellow/golds/brown..... or at least not to the extent I incorporated the colors into the piece and she also wasn't very keen on the pattern and thought the whole thing was just way too masculine looking....

investing a lot of time into a quilt that doesn't please the intended recipient kind of takes the wind out of one's sails.... but that's cool, this isn't the first time I made something that didn't work out...but the other times it was me that didn't like the product... and I know it won't be the last....unless I suddenly quit quilting and that's not gonna happen!

the quilt is so large I couldn't set it up in my normal spots....didn't quite fit on the studio felt wall and no way it could hang on the line outside. only thing I could think of was to put the top on a bed; well I learned that's a problem when there are animals around!

well, it does seem that all the animals really seem to like the quilt.... I do too....but as of now, the quilt will be set aside the back and the quilting will have to wait until I figure out its fate.... for now I think I'm going to play with a palette of bright batiks and start something nice and small....

catch up II

well it hasn't been as long between posts as the last time I gave a studio update, but it's still been a while. on my list of resolutions for 2009 is to be a little bit more attentive to the magical mouse blog. one of the secrets for meeting goals is to set realistic goals -with respect to the magical mouse blog, my intention is to post once each month - if I post more frequently great, but again set realistic goals. I can feel good about meeting my resolution this month - hey I even have days to spare!

the first quilt I finished in the new year is a baby quilt which I am calling the kitty cat garden. I selected a broad assortment of both bright and softly colored fabrics. many of the fabrics feature veggies or whimsically themed prints.

lately I have gotten into stitching words on the borders of quilts. this quilt features several lines from a longfellow poem:

kind hearts are the gardens
kind thoughts are the roots
kind words are the flowers
kind deeds are the fruit

outside of this baby quilt most of the projects undertaken the last couple months have been little useful items which I made to give as holiday quilts - some of these projects include using tee shirts from last year's peace show to make a tote bags such as this one. unfortunately I forgot to take a photo of the next peace show tote - it featured several improvements over this one as I learned much
the words on the back of the tee-shirt I used as a center panel in a pillow for a friend who just happened to win this quilt last year and has it hanging in his bedroom.
I also made a lot of these handy little cloth wallets:
a few placemat and napkin sets for various friends. nothing fancy, just useful items with fabric which reminded me of them.

one friend is a collector of day of the dead objects, so I thought this would go well

another friend has a fondness for the provence and the colors yellow and blue

catch up....not catsup!

oh my! can it really be that the last time I put something up on the magical mouse was august?!

it's a bit of a rhetorical question. yes, it has been since august. I haven't been completely inactive in my world of 'playing with fabric' but for all sorts of reasons I've been a tad neglectful of maintaining the studio blog.

let me try and make right.

starting with my most recent, here are photos of the last three projects I completed with wee descriptions:

the quilt above I entitled 'may the circle be unbroken' - it is a wallhanging and was made to celebrate the upcoming union of two individuals. the center panel uses traditional log cabin blocks arranged to form two interlocking circles. the text around the center panel includes the following:

Our family is a circle of love and strength. Every joy shared adds joy. Every crisis faced makes us stronger. (note: I discovered I misspelled crisis prior to turning the quilt over to anne, who will be giving the quilt as a gift, I fixed the spelling after this photo was taken- however, I could have left the misspelling alone as fitting of the culture of imperfection consciously found amongst many tribes of quilters!)

the quilt measures 36" x 46" - it is machine pieced and hand quilted. the colors of the 'circles' represent the two favorite colors of the two individuals who are being wed.

another fishy quilt!! this was made especially for lil b's sister. this quilt measures approximately 48" x 58" - it is machine pieced and hand quilted. in addition to information about the baby, around the center on three sides of the border I stitched a fragment from the nursery rhyme 'I saw a ship a sailing'

this quilt was made for a friend to give to a friend of hers to celebrate the birth of a child. the child's mother is a podiatrist - hence the flip-flop fabric. I made this quilt while my 'good camera' was in the shop and while I was 'on the road' so the photo is not staged as is the norm. unfortunately I didn't write down the measurements of the quilt - it's my typical size for a baby quilt (which means it's similar in size to the fishy quilt above). time was of the essence to complete this quilt as my friend asked me to make the quilt after the baby had been born. the center of the quilt is hand-tied and only the borders are handquilted.

theme day: wing

I made this quilt a few years ago for my friend j's daughter who was starting college far from home. a few years before this I made a wall hanging for j to celebrate her 50th birthday. j thought it would be nice if her daughter had a quilted wall hanging also to commemorate this rite of passage - leaving home and starting college. my friend is a wonderful parent and when she asked me to make a quilt for her daughter the first thing that came to mind is that saying about good parents give their children both roots and wings....

I thought wings and birds in flight was fittingly symbolic. I designed a quilt with 4 birds flying off in what I thought were the cardinal directions and the triangle border is the tradition flying geese pattern. the center is bordered with a fabric of more winged creatures - butterflies!

rainbow fish II

the rainbow fish quilt is completed and ready for delivery! it's was quite fun to create. the quilt is machine pieced and hand-stitched. the center fish panel has stitching that resembles seaweed and along the border is a little fishy song (words below).

the overall quilt measure approximately 39" by 49" - there are three different size fishes in the quilt. for this quilt the squares were 3" 2 1/2 inches and 2" and half squares cut in a manner to have a finished square that corresponds.

the size of the fish can be customized depending on your overall plan. each fish is made of one square of fabric plus 3 squares of half triangles.

detail of quilt showing a peek at the back. the baby this quilt is for will be born in the chinese year of the rat (or mouse) so the middle starry panel is surrounded by two borders - one of small happy mice and a border of black and white check fabric.

the song - which can be sung to baby to the tune of "I'm a little teapot"

I'm a little fishy
watch me swim
Here is my tail
Here is my fin
When I want to have fun with my friends
I wiggle my tail an dive right in

rainbow fish

during the summer life is so busy I don't have time to do much quilting. however I do have one fun project underway for a friend who has a friend who is expecting a baby this fall. during the interview with my friend where I try and learn a bit about the interests of the family who will be given the quilt, I found out that they were really into fish.

instead of using fabric with fish, I thought I'd make fish out of fabric. I'm calling this quilt "rainbow fish." right now I'm in the quilting stage of the project - I am currently handstitching an overlay of what I hope will appear to be seaweed over the center panel.

since this quilt will be presented to the expecting mother before the birth of her son, I won't have the particulars of name, date of birth, etc. to stitch on the quilt. instead I hope to find a nice children's rhyme or poem to stitch along the border instead. any suggestions?

right now I'm calling this quilt 'rainbow fish' - there is a very popular children's book by marc pfister entitled 'the rainbow fish' - in fact there seems to be a whole series of rainbow fish books!